Armature winding machines have flyers that are rotated to wind coils of wire onto a slotted armature core. These machines have holders that locate the cores between the flyers and index the cores during the winding operation. Drive mechanisms operate to rotate the flyers in opposite directions to simultaneously place two coils of wire into selected slots in the armature cores and start and stop the rotation of the flyers to allow indexing of the cores. An example of this type of armature winding machine is disclosed by Dammar in U.S. Pats. Nos. 3,636,621 and 3,927,843. The holders have collet assemblies that grip the ends of the shafts of the armature cores during the winding operation. The collet assemblies are an integral part of the holders and are not readily removed from the machine. Each assembly has collet members that surround a pocket for accommodating the end of the armature core shaft. There is no structure to alter the size of the pocket so that only one size of shaft can be retained in the collet assembly. The entire holder must be replaced on the machine to accommodate an armature core having a different size shaft. A substantial amount of time and labor is required to remove a holder and replace it with another holder in the conventional armature winding machine.
Armature winding machines have shrouds or wire forms located adjacent the opposite sides of the armature core. The shrouds or wire forms have outer surfaces that guide the wire leaving rotating flyers into selected pairs of slots in the armature core. The central portions of the shrouds have longitudinal recesses for accommodating side portions of the armature core. The side recesses have arcuate configurations that follow the curvature of the armature core. When different sized armature cores are to be wound, different shaped shrouds must be mounted on the supports of the machine. This is a laborious and time consuming task because the shrouds are mounted on the supports in a permanent manner such that they are not readily moved from the supports. These armature winding machines cannot be quickly changed to accommodate different sized and shaped armature cores. The shrouds are mounted on supports in a manner that they are not readily removable from the supports.